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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22609654">everyone but you</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/crookeds/pseuds/crookeds'>crookeds</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 17:14:59</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>5,175</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22609654</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/crookeds/pseuds/crookeds</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p></p><blockquote>
  <p>And after a moment of silence that should be reserved for his own affection, the kind that beats at his ribcage with a weak thump, Felix finally just says, “Well then, you found me, and I’m here.”</p>
  <p>He manages to look back, but only when whatever it is intruding inside him finally dies down into silence.</p>
  <p>“What now?”<br/></p>
</blockquote><br/>Felix comes back; Sylvain tries to convince him to stay.
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Sylvain Jose Gautier</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Chocolate Box - Round 5</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>everyone but you</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightmoonz/gifts">nightmoonz</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p> </p><p>Felix stands at the entrance to Margrave Gautier’s estate, rain drenched, tracking mud onto the pristine marble flooring. He scowls and shivers all at once, his arms crossed as he glowers ahead. Standing alone and waiting for the doorman he’d scared off to return, he tries to convince himself not to leave.</p><p>He looks like—</p><p>“Man, I really need to talk to someone about the strays they’re letting in these days.”</p><p>His face, so stoney, so hard set, suddenly softens at the edges. A little more pliant and willing to let Felix widen his eyes in surprise at the sound of Sylvain’s voice. His eyes lift and catch Sylvain standing only steps away, just outside the light of the fireplace that crackles softly between them. But his hair burns like flame anyways.</p><p>“Usually, I don’t mind, y’know? But—you look kinda rabid. You won’t bite, right?”</p><p>“Idiot,” Felix says it like it hasn’t been ten years. “You’re the one hunting down the strays, strong arming them into coming to your home when they have better things to do.”</p><p>Funny. When he’d been coming here, reluctant and heavy on horseback, he thought his voice might crack. Split down the middle and reveal—</p><p>Well. Nevermind. </p><p>Sylvain laughs, quietly—and maybe a bit in disbelief. </p><p>“Sorry. I, uh- I’m just…” he trails off a bit, stepping forward into the light. Felix sees his face for the first time, swallowing tightly and realizing that it’s all mostly the same. </p><p>The scruff of what wants to be a beard is more persistent about sticking to the lining of his jaw than it was when they were twenty. His shoulders are broader, his hair longer, like it was when they were still kids. Felix has half a mind to curse out loud because he looks taller, somehow, though there’s hope yet that it’s only time and the shadows tricking him into believing so. </p><p>Sylvain is thirty-five years old and he wears adulthood, actual adulthood, far better than Felix ever has and ever will.</p><p>“I’m happy you’re here, Felix,” he murmurs, his voice soft and too genuine all at once. In that disarming, Sylvain way that always makes him want to go running two opposite directions at once.</p><p>Felix sniffs, looking away—he casts his gaze to the side and tries to think of anything else. </p><p>“Right,” he replies.</p><p>And after a moment of silence that should be reserved for his own affection, the kind that beats at his ribcage with a weak thump, Felix finally just says, “Well then, you found me, and I’m here.”</p><p>He manages to look back, but only when whatever it is intruding inside him finally dies down into silence.</p><p>“What now?”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>He remembers this room.</p><p>It’s hardly different from the other bedrooms in Sylvain’s large home. Truly just as garish and over decorated—as Sylvain’s family before him had made it, and as he’d left it. Felix lets his sword fall with a quiet thump against the end of the mattress. He hears the rain, still, louder as it hits the window. In an hour it will be snow, and then by the morning it will have all melted away, back to rain. </p><p>A gloved hand runs over the edge of the window, coming against blunt scars that dent the otherwise perfect shape of the wood. </p><p>It’d been sword fighting on Sylvain’s birthday. </p><p>The two of them rough housing too close to the edge of the room while Dimitri watches timidly from behind the bed post. He flinches away every time Felix lunges forward, now a lone proprietor for “doing the right thing” when he’s quietly abandoned by Ingrid, who leaves the group to go searching for Glenn. </p><p>“You’re going to get us in trouble,” Dimitri cries out over the sounds of wooden swords smacking against each other and the walls. Their swings (Felix’s, at least, though Sylvain isn’t much better) are too wide and careless and perfectly childlike, doing more damage to their surroundings than they do to each other. </p><p>“No way,” Sylvain laughs and easily side steps out of the way of the careless jab of Felix’s attack. “You think they’ll do anything to us when you’re here too?”</p><p>“Then I- I’ll leave!” Dimitri stomps his foot, fists balled up as his arms come straight down his sides. </p><p>“Aw, come on, Dimitri,” says Sylvain, finally looking over, expertly pouting. “It’s my birthday.”</p><p>That does it.</p><p>Felix finds an opening in the distraction, coming down with a hard swing against Sylvain’s side. It catches him off guard, and suddenly Sylvain is reeling with the blunt pain of the wooden sword embedded in his side, suddenly off balance. His hand goes out—the armed one, that is—but his grip is too loose.</p><p>All three of them grimace as the window shatters and the sword goes flying.</p><p>The only thing they hear is the chorus of gasps, a few shrieks as well. A direct consequence of how the glass rains down onto the pavement below, into the gardens where the guests have gathered for tea.</p><p>Felix starts to shout, apologetic and embarrassed, his cheeks go bright red and tears brim in the corner of his eyes— “I’m sor-” but Sylvain clasps a tight hand over his mouth, shushing him harshly.</p><p>The three of them stand there like that, completely silent. </p><p>Of course, until, Lord Rodrigue suddenly yells from below, angry and all too knowing, “Booooooys!”</p><p>Sylvain suddenly grabs them both by the hand, dragging them out of the room. “Run!” They laugh and cry and argue against one another, blistering past a confused and scornful looking Ingrid who stands at the end of the hallway.</p><p>“What are you thinking?”</p><p>Felix tries not to jump out of his skin as he turns to look at Sylvain in the doorway. He looks at him, realizing he’s been being watched, eyes narrowing. </p><p>“You look nostalgic,” Sylvain keeps talking, and Felix scoffs and turns his back to the window and whatever he was reminiscing on. “What does that even mean?” He’s a bad liar. It’s not even a lie; it’s more like a preface to one, but all the same it’s too defensive all at once not to be noticeable.</p><p>“Nevermind. What are you doing here?” Felix covers his tracks. </p><p>“You disappeared so quickly after the meal, I suppose I was kinda worried you’d left again,” He says it lightheartedly, even peppering in a laugh that doesn’t show any sort of strain or betray itself. </p><p>“Are you getting paranoid with age, old man?” One after the other his gloves come off, Felix trying to bear the conversation with idle movements and a gaze that plants itself firmly elsewhere. The worn leather piles neatly on the nightstand next to the bed, and his fingers start to stray towards the many belts and buckles fastened across his chest as well. “I couldn’t leave if I wanted to, anyways.” The armor peels off, still damp with rain underneath where it’d stayed fastened to his clothes, and that gets tossed to the side as well. “Damned rain.”</p><p>“You know,” Sylvain, Felix realizes, has been approaching all the while, and he only notices when Sylvain takes the leather armor in his hand to place it elsewhere. “You did arrive here in this rain.”</p><p>“So?”</p><p>“So, I’m saying I don’t think it’s really stopping you. Not that much.”</p><p>“I wanted a roof and a meal. Stop trying to imply something. Just say it, if you have to.”</p><p>“Plenty of taverns near with roofs and meals.”</p><p>“Still an expert at trying to make sure I never want to have anything to do with you,” Felix mutters, thoughtlessly, carelessly. But the bite of his tongue could do Sylvain some good, so when he feels apologetic afterwards, it’s only slightly.</p><p>“Hey,” Sylvain says, not missing a beat; not once does the conversation falter. “Time means practice. I’ll have you begging to be let out of here within a couple of days.”</p><p>“Make that a couple of minutes.”</p><p>An elbow meets his side, a soft jab that officially marks the first time Sylvain makes contact with Felix in ten years. </p><p>But who’s counting.</p><p>“I’ll see you in the morning.”</p><p>He says it like there’s something hidden underneath, and Felix bristles away from the touch, staring up at Sylvain, peering for the extra meaning. Until he averts his eyes and sits on the edge of the bed, deciding he doesn’t want or need to know.</p><p>“Fine. Goodnight.”</p><p>There’s the cut of his tongue again, looking for skin. But when Felix watches out of the corner of his eye he realizes that Sylvain leaves the room with a smile.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>In Sylvain’s study, Felix is handed a map bound with string. Sylvain gives it reluctantly, raising a brow when Felix’s snatches it out of his hand. “The details and location are in there. A group of mages, apparently left over from Those Who Slither In The Dark.”</p><p>“I thought Edelgard and the professor took care of them.”</p><p>“Most of them. Enough to stop the uprisings. But there are others that either weren’t at that final battle or got away.”</p><p>“Tch." </p><p>“Think of them like… garden snakes. Really aggressive, necromantic garden snakes.”</p><p>“Sure. I’ll be fine. I’ve dealt with worse.”</p><p>“So I’ve heard.”</p><p>Felix opens his mouth to demand an explanation for that comment—but if Sylvain has been looking for him, then he’s heard about the bloody encounters Felix has left behind over the years. How heavy it seems now, unsaid between the two of them. The only thing he was left with after the war was his sword and the rest of his life. He could write a book of hypocrisies with the rest of what he avoids thinking of.</p><p>Sylvain interrupts whatever he might counteract with, anyways. “You’ll come back, right?” He takes a seat in the grand chair that used to so often house his father, as Felix remembers it. Chalk it up as another reminder of many that things are different and all the same.  </p><p>“Of course,” his voice makes the air around the shiver with a clinical professionalism that even he disdains. His shoulders tense and he can feel his jaw set into place like it does when he’s being stubborn.  “You’ll have my reward waiting for me.”</p><p>“Ouch,” Sylvain says, not sounding hurt at all. He leans over his desk, rummaging for a few books that are already open; a few letters that need finished writing. They both have work to do, Felix supposes, but it feels sad to have the difference between them so obvious now.</p><p>This could have been Felix one day too.</p><p>“Fair enough. But you know you could always—”</p><p>“Pathetic,” says Felix, suddenly, and even Sylvain has to stop what he’s doing and look up at him. His mouth hangs open; it has been a few years since he’s picked a fight with the end of Felix’s barbs.</p><p>“Wh—”</p><p>“When was the last time you picked up a sword?”</p><p>“You…” Sylvain crosses his arms, eyebrow cocked. “Not as long as you think, probably. But I’ve got other things to do.”</p><p>“Papers to write,” Felix deadpans. “How thrilling”</p><p>“Women to fall in love with.”</p><p>“I can’t stand you, and you sitting there is just making me angrier.” He begins to exit the room, waiting for Sylvain to follow. “Find some practice swords and meet me in the courtyard.”</p><p>“Felix,” he whines, standing regardless. “Felix I don’t-”</p><p>“Now!”</p><p>And then they fight with dulled blades on the stone courtyard of the Gautier estate. Sylvain is slower than he used to be and Felix is faster. Sweat pours down both their faces and they come upon their second hour of Felix goading Sylvain into picking his sword back up, just to be disarmed immediately. </p><p>Though Sylvain seems to remember flashes of his training at Garreg Mach. Muscle memory unearths itself and finally Felix’s sword flies up into the air when it’s pried out of his palm, soaring over their heads. The sunlight glints off the dull silver, and Sylvain grins as he watches it go. “Guess you underestimated me, huh?”</p><p>Felix catches the hilt before the sword can hit the ground. He comes forward with a flurry of blows, barely blocked by a shocked Sylvain who teeters backwards, losing his footing and suddenly hitting the ground. His sword falls from his hand, clattering by his side.</p><p>“No,” says Felix, too smug for his own good. “Not really.”</p><p>He turns on his heel, done with this, forearm coming up to wipe the sweat off his face. Which is lucky for him, as it serves as a sort of cushion for his face when Sylvain suddenly tackles him to the ground. Felix curses aloud, immediately kicking, but Sylvain knows to dodge and comes down on top of him with about as much mercy as Felix has shown him over the course of training together.</p><p>“You- idiot- why do you always do this!?” He grits it out, knee coming into Sylvains stomach, biting back a groan when Sylvain grabs a tuff of hair and pulls it loose into the fist of his hand. </p><p>“Dammit- damn you!”</p><p>“You might be faster, but you know I’ll always be stronger.”</p><p>They wrestle on the stone, kicking up dirt around them, grabbing and pulling and kicking and just shy of biting, probably, but lucky them they’re grown men fighting outside of the house and not children.</p><p>It ends when Sylvain winds up on top, knees planted firmly at Felix’s sides, his hands pinning his wrists tight to the ground. His grip is taut, teeth and lip bloody from Felix directing a strong elbow to the front of his face. Both of them settle, their chests heaving and breath ragged, while Felix still squirms for freedom underneath. </p><p>Sylvain’s face is wreathed by graying twilight; the sight of heavy clouds that never relent hanging darkly over his head, broken only occasionally by thin streaks of sunset. And even when he smells like sweat and dirt Felix can pick up the hint of clover and honey laid thin against his skin. </p><p>If his hand weren’t pinned down, he may give into the temptation then. It’s simply a matter of reaching up to catch his hair between two fingers as they both settle from rough housing violence into—</p><p><em>Oh</em>. Felix suddenly rips his wrists free, bringing the flat of his palms to Sylvain’s chest with a hefty shove that sends him flying back.</p><p>Sylvain hits the ground with an ugly thud, and Felix scrambles to his feet, darting back inside without another word.</p><p>An hour later, less, actually, and he’s left the grounds. </p><p>It begins to rain before then. And if he thinks more about the storm and where he’ll be taking shelter tonight, his horse bolting forward into the dark, he can pretend that he didn’t notice Sylvain in the window of his study, watching him depart.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>It could have been easier, once. </p><p>It was, once.</p><p>Just after the end of all the fighting. When Felix was only just beginning to feel the dread of not having a war to cover the the many cracks that had gradually spread all over him when made to endure its weight. He’d forgotten his pride and his heaviness just long enough to replace it with something else—a heartbeat too loud and a hand to hold.</p><p>“We have so much… time, now.” Sylvain had said, perched against a tree underneath a bleeding red sky. The wind of Garreg Mach was cold that evening, brisk with change and dusk. “Or we will, anyways, when it’s over.” </p><p>Even still, Felix couldn’t look at him. </p><p>“I didn’t really think I’d make it. Don’t know how I did—”</p><p>“You know why we’re here, Sylvain. Don’t feign ignorance,” Felix said it with a tightness in his throat.</p><p>“I know.”</p><p>He felt him watching him, staring intently as if Sylvain was waiting for him to look back. But all he could do was wonder how he’d let himself be caught in the midst of so many what if’s.</p><p>“I don’t regret it.” </p><p>Sylvain took his hand, and nothing else needed to be said or explained with the existence of one simple action. And Felix didn’t pull away. </p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>All that’s left, once he’s done cutting them down, is the quiet drip of water on the cavern floor. Light fights to filter in through the mouth of the cave, fragmented and broken but reaching just enough that Felix doesn’t have to search long for the break of dawn that greets him outside.</p><p>And it’s light that always reminds him that he’s not dreaming, or worse. The sky is subtle and calm over his head, the breeze no longer damp and musty like the inside of a cave, but brisk and sharp against his cheeks. Blood runs thick down the front of his neck, not his own, and Felix seems to breathe for the first time in—well, he’s not sure how long—when he comes to his knees in the dirt. </p><p>And it does and doesn’t need to be asked: how long can he keep doing this? Really?</p><p>He wipes the red off with the palm of his hand, cleaning nothing off but pulling at it like it removes a weight or a burning from his skin. It comes down in streaks across his throat, left in the shape of his fingers.</p><p>Oh well.</p><p>He breathes out, chest heavy, like he’s expelling something from his lungs too, his eyes closing as he does.</p><p>Eyes staying shut, he feels a presence loom over his shoulder. But not really—it’s impossible. Though the reality of the moment isn’t as much of an assurance as it should be, and suddenly, wearily, his shoulders are tight and his throat feels raw. When his arm swings out, sword in hand, the air cuts and hisses. His movements are comparable to that of an animal, the way he twists around, ready to catch and cut whatever—whoever— looms behind down.</p><p>But nothing's there. No one’s there, which lets him breath the slightest air of relief.</p><p>Though he wishes that guilt was so palpable. That it would give him the opportunity to cut it down.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>His boots echo down the corridors of Sylvain’s home, rattling the doors and shaking portrait in their frames as he storms by. In fact, he nearly knocks down a vase in his efforts to move quickly, though all it really does is rattles unsteadily on a wooden display, threatening to reveal Felix even more than he reveals himself. The idea, before entering, was to grab his things and disappear without so much as a goodbye to Sylvain in the process of doing so. But across the house he can already hear the sound of Sylvain calling his name, growing closer as he surely runs across to stop him.</p><p>“You’re alive!” He calls out from over Felix’s shoulder, who doesn’t reply and instead whips a hard right into the bedroom he’d stayed in the night before. </p><p>“Of course I am,” he says, prideful chip ever present on his shoulder.</p><p>“You’re- hey-!”</p><p>He moves cut and dry, like everything is decided before he does it. His things are packed within seconds, considering how little he actually has, it’s when he tries to go out the door that Sylvain finally appears in it. </p><p>“You’re leaving.”</p><p>“I finished. They’re dead. I’m leaving.”</p><p>He tries to push. Sylvain doesn’t budge, but reaches a hand out for a firm grasp on Felix’s shoulder. Steadying him, stopping him. “Felix-”</p><p>“What did you think was going to-”</p><p>“Just wait-”</p><p>“- happen? Thought I’d stay?”</p><p>“Felix.”</p><p>
  <em>“What!?”</em>
</p><p>He raises his voice. Naturally. Furious and rain soaked, bright stains of red still running down his neck and down the front of his chest as he glares up at Sylvain.</p><p>“We can get you cleaned up, first, at least,” he says, throwing in a disbelieving laugh for good measure. “You walk out of here looking like that and everyone’s going to think you’ve put an end to my bloodline.”</p><p>It’s infuriating more than it is comforting, how easily Sylvain can disengage the traps Felix sets before him. It could be his own fault; they’re obvious enough. Perhaps as bombastic and loud as they are easy to step over. He so easily forgets until he is forced to remember all the easy wit and sheer sense of knowing that Sylvain keeps folded neatly and hidden under his sleeve. </p><p>Overhead, it begins to rain again. He hears the water fall against the window, and the sound of the roof catching the storm fills the room and the rest of the home whole.</p><p>It’s a sound to drown in, surely.</p><p>“Fine,” says Felix. </p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>He shouldn’t be so surprised that it winds up the way that it does. </p><p>Or really, he should have at least made a few more mental precautions. Then maybe he’d be out the door, at a tavern, still warm and slightly drunk and quietly into the bottomless pit of whatever hole has been eating itself through his stomach for the past ten years, but alone at least. </p><p>He stands by the fire in Sylvain’s study, warming up quickly, his skin almost too hot under the thick layers of clothing and armor he still insists on wearing. No more blood stains, and his hair is tied neatly for once. He drinks a glass of liquor that’s just as warming as the fire when it goes down his throat and tries to be mindful of how much he’s had.</p><p>A few feet away he hears Sylvain pouring into his own glass again, sitting on the edge of his desk and staring after Felix.</p><p>“Your reward wasn’t set to arrive until the morning, anyways,” he admits, suddenly, before drinking again.</p><p>“You planned this,” Felix murmurs, quiet and annoyed, still staring at the fire.</p><p>“An honest mistake,” says Sylvain, putting the emptied glass back down at his side.</p><p>“Honest,” his laugh is really a scoff, and he hopes it sounds as bitter as he wants it to. “Is that a joke?”</p><p>“Felix,” says Sylvain, sighing again, halfway to pleading with him. “Just sit down. Please. Drink with me, for one more night.”</p><p>“You won’t change my mind,” he says, cooly, finally looking at him. “I have better things to do out there than I ever will here.”</p><p>“Like what?’</p><p>When Felix leaves, he’d at least like for Sylvain not to wish he’d come back. </p><p>“More than you’ve done for the rest of the world.”</p><p>“It’s a big world, Felix.” Sylvain’s voice finally cuts in a way that shows his edge, and Felix revels in the smallest victory at the sound of the strain. “Even you’ll have a hard time doing anything for it.”</p><p>“Then you feel good about yourself?” Felix turns to look at him, the grip on his glass just shy of resulting in a bloody palm. “Staying here, sitting in the same room your father used to? Doing the same things that he did.”</p><p>“You know it’s different.”</p><p>“Is it? Because it all feels the same to me. Don’t act like wars wouldn’t be started again if a member of the nobility-”</p><p>“What, you want to change the world then? Again?” </p><p>“I want-”</p><p>“- sometimes things just are the way that they are, Felix, and there’s nothing we can do other than what we’ve already done.”</p><p>“Then maybe I want to figure out what everybody died for, if that’s all this is.”</p><p>“You’re not going to find it, Felix.”</p><p>“How would you know that. All you do is sit here-”</p><p>“Dimitri is dead.”</p><p>A beat between the two of them, barbed with the promise to hurt either of them if they come too close. There it is, finally, said out loud. They know it’s why he can’t stay, and Felix feels the meaning of it surge through his stomach, up his throat like the truth is bile.</p><p>“Do you think I’m stupid?”</p><p>Sylvain looks at him, shoulders sagging as he lets out a long breath and scrubs his face with his hand. </p><p>“Are you—I mean,” and he watches between the gaps of his fingers before letting his hand fall back down. “You remember what he was like at the end of it all.”</p><p>Glass hits the floor, not shattering but rolling loudly across the hardwood as Felix suddenly leaps forward and takes Sylvain by the collar of his shirt, shoving against him until they both nearly fall over the desk.</p><p>“Why would I stay—when I want nothing to do with you?”</p><p>And then Felix lets him go, stepping backwards, still gritting his teeth. His stomach churns as much as his blood boils, and he keeps his hands balled into fists at his sides as soon as they’re empty. </p><p>He forces another beat to pass, eventually letting his breath rattle out of his lungs as he looks at Sylvain, vision a little clearer. </p><p>Regret tinges the way he sees him now, though. He’s done this before—cut too close and gone too far, but always ready to apologize later.</p><p>Not that he’ll let himself be there to say sorry.</p><p>Felix turns awkwardly on his heel, going to the door so that he can leave without another word. </p><p>The only thing Felix can hear as he does so is the rain that will be there to greet him outside.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>He’s only barely past the courtyard, coming onto the end of the grounds, when a hand suddenly takes his arm.</p><p>And were he in any other state, he might try to cut that hand off. He doesn’t hear the approach when the air is so loaded with angry wind, rain water cutting through the air mercilessly, but his gut and his guilt assure him that it’s Sylvain that comes after him.</p><p>“I love you, Felix,” said over the pouring water that refuses to give them any room to breathe. But Sylvain makes sure he is heard, regardless, and Felix can only give into the dumbfounded expression on his face and the sinking feeling of his stomach as a result.</p><p>He rips his arm back, pointing a finger into Sylvain’s chest. “No, you don’t—”</p><p>No fast enough. Sylvain cuts him off, grabbing his arm again. “I love you, Felix—”</p><p>“Shut up—how do you know that? Why would you?”</p><p>“Because I’ve always—”</p><p>Felix yells, louder than Sylvain, louder than the rain. </p><p>“I left. You don’t <em>love</em> me.”</p><p>“Then come back!”</p><p>Felix is trying to stop him; pulling away once more, storming off but never enough because Sylvain never stops following. It feels like a fight—no swords, but the words cut through enough in their place. </p><p>“Stop it—”</p><p>“Give me the chance—”</p><p>“I will never be happy. I won’t be content pretending that any of this is right.”</p><p>“You’ve never even tried.”</p><p>“Because I don’t want to!”</p><p>“If you die like him—” </p><p>The mere mention of Dimitri triggers a similar response as before: Felix rounding on his heel, facing Sylvain, pushing him away with balled up fists that beat try to beat angrily against his chest. </p><p>“I am nothing like the boar!” A beat passes, tensely drawn between them both before Felix concludes, “And if he were anything like me, then maybe he would still be alive.”</p><p>Sylvain stumbles backwards, with desperation etched so deeply into his expression that it makes Felix nauseous, but his hands linger against his chest a moment too long. Sylvain doesn’t hesitate—and Felix feels the smoothness of his palms around the jut of his wrists.</p><p>He grits his teeth. </p><p>(No, it wasn’t supposed to be this way.)</p><p>“You would regret asking me to stay.”</p><p>“I have never regretted you, Felix,” He’s quieter, or maybe the rain is even louder, but still, “I’ve got plenty to regret, and I’ve lied plenty of times, but the one promise I made when we were kids is the only one I think I’ll ever bother to keep.”</p><p>Lightning overhead. The storm worsens, and the sky is dark only getting darker as the clouds roll and crash over them.</p><p>(And yet—)</p><p>“Just stop. It’s pointless.”</p><p>“You know that I won’t.”</p><p>“Love is more than a childhood promise, you idiot.”</p><p>Sylvain counters, immediately. “We are more than the promise we made as children.”</p><p>Another beat passes between them. Thunder overhead, deafeningly loud; he feels himself shaking because of the sound and because of—<em>well</em>. But still, Felix hears what comes next with unnerving clarity. </p><p>“And you’re worth more than his death. I thought you of all people would have believed that.”</p><p>He doesn’t have an answer.</p><p>But his hand breaks free—just one managing to pull back, fist clenched—only to come back, palm flat against the side of Sylvain’s neck.</p><p>“I’ll say please again, if you want,” Sylvain laughs, the sound shakier than either of them are willing to admit to. His breath between the two of them rises, cold, begging for warmth.</p><p>“Just—” Felix’s voice is still tense, as is his jaw, and the rest of his body feels rigid, giving into this much affection. He’s been starved of it, he knows that, but it was never a priority until Sylvain reminded him of it.</p><p>“Just stop talking.”</p><p>He doesn’t have an answer, but he leans up and pulls Sylvain down, all at once, kissing him slowly. His mouth is reluctant, and the rest of him is still unsure. But then he’s kissing Sylvain like he hasn’t kissed him in years, his heart beating loudly in his ear drums as they resort to holding onto one another in the rain.</p><p>Felix pulls back—and he notices the way Sylvain tries not to let him go, leaning forward for more. Worried that there might not be anything else after this.</p><p>He still doesn’t have an answer.</p><p>Sylvain thumbs against his cheek, speaking in place of where one might be.</p><p>“You can go,” he says. “When it stops raining. I won’t stop you.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Felix wakes in Sylvain’s bed.</p><p>For a moment his body is only languid limbs and comfort and warmth, lost in white sheets, feeling the weight of Sylvain on the mattress next to him. His eyes don’t open at first, too content to dare reality into challenging him with anything other than this.</p><p>But they open, eventually, not facing Sylvain but looking to the open window of his bedroom that pours the morning sky onto the both of them.</p><p>Bright and blue, it folds sunlight over them both, and Felix frowns at the intrusion. He sits up slowly, the bed barely creaking underneath his weight, silently padding over to the window to take in the view.</p><p>The weather is calm. Small pools of water collect the light, mirroring the brilliant view from above as, for once, the sky is cloudless. The earth yawns past dawn into the morning with a still ease and the promise to be serene. For the first time in several days, it doesn’t rain.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>
  <em>“I wish you'd stayed.” / "I wish I had stayed, too."</em>
</p><p>— Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Happy chocolate box day! I hope that you enjoy this. &lt;3</p><p> </p><p>  <a href="https://twitter.com/umbrapryna">(yell @ me abt fire emblem)</a></p></blockquote></div></div>
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